PA Planning For Post-UN Bid Backlash
The Palestinian Authority has quietly made plans to run its government in exile following its petition for the declaration of a Palestinian state at the United Nations, this column has learned.
The contingency is to be put in place if Israel cracks down on Palestinian institutions or arrests Palestinian leaders in response to the PA’s move to abandon talks and instead seek a state unilaterally at the UN.
Already, Israel has been debating taking some punitive steps against the PA, including holding back tax revenues and economic cooperation following any UN vote. Last week, Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon warned Israel could halt economic assistance to the PA.
The Israeli government, however, has already indicated it will likely continue to transfer tax revenue to the PA.
Meanwhile, Turkey has been leading a campaign to raise money from the Arab world if U.S. and European funding to the Palestinian Authority is halted in the wake of the PA’s bid to declare statehood at the United Nations, Palestinian security sources told this column.
However, a number of PA officials, speaking on background, said there was no indication either that the U.S. or the European Union would withhold financial aid.
Currently, the vast majority of all aid to the PA comes from the U.S. and EU. According to figures released by the PA, only 22 percent of the $530,000,000 it received since the beginning of 2010 came from Arab donors.
Major Palestinian factions, including terrorist organizations, reject Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s United Nations statehood request, arguing that Abbas does not represent the Palestinian people.
Hamas spokesperson Sami Abu Zuhri said Abbas’s UN petition “lacks any legitimacy.”
“Abbas’s speech includes a huge contradiction between his own personal point of view and the great majority of the Palestinian people,” he told KleinOnline, this reporter’s news site.
Abu Mujaheed, spokesperson for the Popular Resistance Committees, a major Gazan jihadist group, told KleinOnline that Abbas’s UN petition “was a spectacle for the media.”
“Palestinians know it will bring our cause nowhere,” he said. “For Palestinians, the borders are based on 1948 [all of Israel] and this is not negotiable.” Mujaheed blasted Abbas as not representing the majority of the Palestinian people.
Dawd Jihab, a spokesperson for the Iranian-backed Islamic Jihad terror group, said Abbas’s UN proposal “doesn’t enjoy any Palestinian consensus. The priority should be to complete a reconciliation agreement with all Palestinian factions and then to make a strategy for the next stage of confrontation with the enemy.”
Abu Saqer, leader of Jihadiya Salafia, which represents Al Qaeda ideology in Gaza, told KleinOnline that “the Palestinian people do not believe in any international institutions or sponsorship.
“Any giving up of any part of Palestine is refused and represents only a spokesperson that gave a speech and not any true Palestinian,” he said.
A Guyana-born naturalized American citizen fits the Federal Elections Commission’s requirements to run for president, the FEC announced in a ruling.
The case involves New York lawyer Abdul Hassan, who was born in the South American country in 1974. Hassan argues it is discriminatory to not allow him to run for office. Hassan petitioned the FEC to allow him to run for president, arguing the Federal Election Campaign Act does not bar naturalized citizens from running. In its official response earlier this month, the FEC agreed with Hassan’s logic.
The FEC’s ruling, which did not receive any news media attention, concluded that a naturalized citizen is not prohibited by the Federal Election Campaign Act from becoming a “candidate” as defined under the act.
While the FEC’s own rules now allow Hassan to run for high office, the attorney must still clear judicial hurdles before his eligibility becomes official. At issue is the constitutional stipulation that only a “natural born” citizen can run for president. In his legal argument, Hassan contended the constitutional eligibility clause discriminates against naturalized citizens. He cites Supreme Court rulings that interpret the Constitution as providing “equal protection” to naturalized citizens. Other rulings cited by Hassan guarantee against the discrimination of naturalized citizens.
“The natural born requirement – that was adapted in the 1780’s at a time when slavery was also a part of the constitution,” Hassan told this reporter. Hassan added the eligibility requirement should be reinterpreted in a way that would allow naturalized citizens to run for president.
Responding to criticism of possible dual-loyalty issues, Hassan said in a radio interview that a person’s place of birth should not determine his patriotism or presidential eligibility. “I am an attorney,” he said. “When I undertake the representation of a client, I have to act in the best interests of my client,” Hassan stated on “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio” on New York’s WABC Radio.
Continued Hassan: “If I represent someone in my community and I undertake your representation, I owe you 100% loyalty and my duty is solely to protect and to advance your interests.”
Pressed further about the Constitution’s concerns regarding those born overseas, Hassan argued many U.S. citizens have loyalty issues as well.
Aaron Klein is Jerusalem bureau chief and senior reporter for WorldNetDaily.com. He is also host of an investigative radio program on New York’s 770-WABC Radio, the largest talk radio station in the U.S., every Sunday between 2-4 p.m. His website is KleinOnline.com.